We have 16 days until we kick off this year’s Community Toy Store!
We have dozens of folks signed up to volunteer, 24 Community Partners from all over Whatcom County, and the toys are rolling in. It’s not to late to donate or volunteer so send me an email if you are interested! cameron@mybirchwood.org
Blessings!
The Leadership students at Birchwood Elementary have done an awesome job with this. We partnered together to expand the food drive beyond the walls of the school. What if we got the neighborhood involved and made it a neighborhood wide canned food drive?
Everyone loved the idea and it presented an opportunity for the leadership students to be a part of something even bigger than the year before. Imagine a group of 4th and 5th graders leading a neighborhood effort to gather canned goods to donate to the Lighthouse Mission…
That is just what they have done. We had a student speak at our Birchwood Neighborhood Association meeting and as a result the school had several neighbors bringing in donations over the course of the last week. The students made bins to station at Albertsons (The only grocery store in the Birchwood Neighborhood) and collected food there. Little Caesars is donating a pizza party to the class at the school that brings in the most canned goods.
This has become a truly neighborhood event, led by these fine young students (Yes even the one that scolded me for wearing flip flops in November).
The results are in and the students collected over 1500 cans of food! The Lighthouse Mission picked them all up this morning, just in time for Thanksgiving.
Good job to Ms. Hinshaw and the Leadership Students!
There is now a Birchwood School Garden Facebook Page! Join the group and get the latest updates!
Birchwood Elementary had its Open House last night! Principal Dave Adams opened it up to the community and we had the church next door (CBF) fill 5 tables with food and beverage for all the students and their parents, we had the Cub Scouts, Rebound of Whatcom County, Operation School Bell, and of course the Birchwood Neighborhood Association represented.
It was so neat to see all the kids excited about starting school and getting a chance to show off their classrooms to their parents! Lots of great conversations with folks and even got a few people more informed about the neighborhood and the neighborhood association.
Great job to all the volunteers that brought the community to the school.
During a meeting with the principal of Birchwood Elementary, DA, he expressed that the school had a lot of at risk youth that would benefit from a quality after school program. DA had tried in the past to bring organizations in to provide this much needed service but it just didn’t work out. I mentioned Rebound (Our partners in the Community Toy Store) having a state licensed after school program and he was interested in meeting with SA, the Director of Rebound.
After leaving DA’s office I immediately called Rebound and setup a meeting between Birchwood Elementary, Rebound and myself.
On December 16 that meeting happened and the result is that kids from Birchwood Elementary are going to be bussed using school district transportation to the existing Flying Colors site, a mere 2 miles down the road.
This should begin in January and hopefully will prove to be a fruitful relationship!
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